India’s crude oil imports see first monthly fall since Iran sanctions

India’s crude oil imports declined by 11.4 per cent year-on-year in November, the first fall since Iranian crude was restricted due to US sanctions.

Imports have risen every month in the current financial year except April when it fell by 5.4 per cent year-on-year.

While imports by government-owned firms decreased by 1.9 per cent in November that by private companies fell by 25.1 per cent.

One of the reasons for the decline could be cuts made by Russian oil giant Roseneft-owned Nayara Energy, which used to import six million barrels a month but had started cutting imports even before the sanctions were kicked in.

India has restricted its monthly purchase to 1.25 million tonne, or 15 million tonne in a year (300,000 barrels per day), down from 22.6 million tonne (452,000 barrels per day) bought in 2017-18.

Two of its refiners — Indian Oil Corp and Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals — bought 1.25 million tonne of oil from Iran in November and December.

India, which uses 80 per cent of imported crude oil for its requirements, imports around 10 per cent of its crude oil requirement from Iran, the third-largest supplier after Saudi Arabia and Iraq.

For 2018-19, India had planned to import about 25 million tonne of crude oil from Iran, up from 22.6 million tonne imported in 2017-18. But the actual volumes is set to fall following the sanctions. —FE